On Sunday, August 26th there was a tremendous storm and flash flooding in Chicago which flooded sewer lines, over ran the beaches and cost taxpayers untold amounts of money.
On that very night, Raoul
sat on the railing that spanned the Jackson Street Bridge. Overlooking the Chicago River, which was, by this
point, churning furiously. Idly Raoul
wondered if the raging waters would reach the top of the bridge or not. It seemed an actual possibility as the
current strength of the wind and the sheer amount of rain, kept threatening to
push him off his perch. This was true, even
as a he clung, with his claws and growing strength, to the chipped red metal
that made up the railing. The cats,
which were always with him, were not in fact with him at this moment. They had gathered nearby at the yawning that
covered the entrance to Union Station. From this relatively dry spot, they all
stared at him with reprehension. Raoul
completely ignored their feline contempt.
He liked the rain and if they didn’t, so be it.
In fact,
the rain wasn’t just good, it was marvelous.
The Gangrel, squeezed his eyes shut and threw back his head. The bombardment of drops on his face was
there to be relished. They hit with such
force it was almost painful, so all the better.
The rain plastered his hair to his head and his clothing to his slender
body. The shirt was red and supposedly
that was a big deal in the dragons. Not
that you would know it. No no no … Unwanted thoughts began to churn in his head again.
Raoul
squeezed his eyes all the tighter and tried to think of nothing but the wind
and the rain and the devastation it was causing. Unfortunately the picture wouldn’t leave his
mind. The picture was his sister, sorry,
broodmate, pointing the Desert Eagle gun at him while she laughed and laughed. Oh how she loved to make a fool of him in
public and Raoul did not understand why.
If it had been any other gun but a Desert Eagle it probably would have
been all right. But Raoul had remembered
the last time a Desert Eagle was pointed in his direction. The only result that could come from that particular memory was consuming panic.
Once
again, only in his head but real all the same, the sleeping child’s head
exploded in his arms even as Raoul had held him so close to try and protect him. The Prince of the city had been holding the Desert Eagle that last time but a gun was a gun and it was all Raoul saw. Automatically, it seemed,
Raoul teleported in a jerk reaction just too escape the gun and the horror. Being of the Vedma bloodline he had the trick of blood minions and teleporting. Unfortunately in his hurry to activate the power, Raoul simply went into the closest blood minion. Who, inauspiciously, was exactly three feet behind him. As Xiao Feng correctly
pointed out, three feet would not make a difference to a gun. Not wanting to admit his fear, Raoul had
replied flippantly replied that he was merely showing off. Gangrels
were not the type of be fearful, at least on paper. Only later did Raoul realize that saying that to Xiao Feng was one more mistake
on top of another. As surely his father would now hear about it and that thought brought Raoul shame.
Blue Gangrel eyes opened behind their pointless glasses. The glasses were pointless both because Raoul's vision
was actually perfect and because the rain had rendered the glasses useless. It was hard to see in the storm but Raoul
wasn’t actually looking at the scene before him. He was looking right into the eyes of the
Beast, which were not eyes, and the Beast was looking right back at him. The Beast was his anger, his resentment, his embarrassment,
his broken heart. Once again she had
broken his heart. Grandma Rose was his
sister. Grandma Rose should be on his
side. Grandma Rose should not seek out
ways to embarrass him, to constantly put him down.
These brooding
thoughts stopped abruptly when the Beast began to laugh. The shrill and high pitched sound was only in his head but Raoul
felt as if his ears might bleed. Oh how
it laughed at the pain Raoul insisted was wrapped around his heart. The shrieks of its laughter ripped through the vampire’s head as it displayed, for it's delectation, the scope of Raoul's stupidity. There was no sister, there was no father, and
there was no Chicago or today or tomorrow.
There was only the Beast. The
Beast was everything and everything was him. The Beast was lust for violence, for
death, for the hunt and for the blood, especially the blood. This hunger swirled in Raoul's head, matching with the whirling rain and in response, he
pulled back his lip and snarled viciously at the storm.
Fool me once,
shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on
me. Fool me thrice, well, we’re both
fucked. “Kill her.” The words, that weren’t words, were in his
head. Now the sounds the Beast made circled around into a seductive purr. The metal of the railing
began to distort under the strength of Raoul’s grasp as the Beast poured pictures
into his head. Pictures of Grandma Rose
begging for her life, the shocked look on her face as Raoul took that Desert
Eagle from her and put it to her head.
Bang, bang, bang. Oh that would make such a
splattering of blood, brains, bone, the cry of pain and surprise. Then fire, fire, burn her, burn her, watch
her skin, cook and peel. How he would love to see that dance of desperation in the flames.
Now it
was Raoul who was laughing and laughing, right out loud. Right into the rain as Morchiana The Lake,
threw her little temper tantrum. The Beast
wrapped its arms, which were not arms, around Raoul and promised him the world
and Raoul believed him. The two flowed into each other and they
were now one. It was the surrendered to the utter pleasure of pure undiluted
brutality. Blue eyes were now red when Raoul
leapt backwards off the railing. As if starved he looked around for anything alive and spyed his cats. They were his pets and basically his only
friends. Grabbing one up Raoul ripped
into it with his fangs and with his claw tore it open as the innocent creature managed one
scream of pain. Blood and guts splashed
all over the Beast who wore the clothing and body of Raoul but was not Raoul.
The rain, the glorious drenching rain was there to wash all the blood
away. The Beast screamed as it continued
to tear at the carcass in its twisted claws and fangs. It was a scream of victory, of unlimited joy
and it sounded hard above even the rain.
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